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We are about 15 pages into our first read aloud of the year- Rebecca Stead’s When You Reach Me. So far I think it’s working out well with our 55 minute periods. I’ve been dedicating the first 10 minutes of the class to our read-aloud in order to motivate my students to get to class on time. Seems to be working so far!

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Good question! We don’t start till Monday, but I’m mulling this over. I am considering When You Reach Me because of my NYTimes review and because it is my Newbery pick and it would be fun for the kids if it won. At least one child has read it already, however. (She was in a book camp program where they read the book and met the author.)

We are reading Wednesday Wars by Gary Schmidt in my 8th grade language arts class. I usually read The Watsons Go to Birmingham by Christopher Paul Curtis in 6th grade LA, but we are going to do When Zachary Beaver Came to Town by Kimberly Willis Holt. I’ve done both in the past and the books have the perfect mix of great writing, characters that suck the students in, humor, and some excellent life lessons.

I’m reading The Brilliant Fall of Gianna Z by Kate Messner to my 7th graders. We are studying biomes this year in science, and the kids have to do a leaf project similar to the one assigned to Gianna in the book. The kids are loving the story. My 8th grade LA class is a tougher bunch. I’m reading them Freak the Mighty. I’m hoping the majority of them will get into it, but I have a weird dynamic in that class of mostly boys (13 out of 17 students are boys) where two passively surly boys silently intimidate everyone into not engaging, reacting, or showing any sign of enjoying what we are doing. That is my challenging group!